Argh! On my own campus! =(
 

"According to a police report of the incident, Wallenstein was driving a 2003 Chrysler PT Cruiser north on West Campus Drive about 8:30 p.m. Feb. 19 when he turned right onto Perry Street. Tech freshman Brian Undercoffer then rode his bicycle into the rear driver's-side tire of the car,..."

Here's another one to go into the Police/Media bias bin. The Prof violates the right of way of the cyclist but, surprise(!), it was Mr. Undercoffer who rode into the car.

Speedo

Tenure rules.

Can someone help me understand how a right hooked cyclist can hit the left rear tire of the turning car?

I can only see this happening if the cyclist was riding against traffic.

This does not mean the motorist did not violate ROW, but it certainly doesn't sound like a classic right hook.

Al

hmm... you make a good point.

I suppose somehow the cyclist could have swerved to avoid hitting the back of the PT Cruiser, in correcting for the swerve hit the driver's side rear tire... but that does seem a little hard to believe.

With how spare that report was, it's difficult to figure out what the heck happened... but the cyclist riding the wrong way down the street would make a lot more sense (I see plenty of people doing it around here, even on fairly small side streets where there are smoother parallel one-way streets running the correct way).

The report is obviously flawed and it's hard to draw any conclusions (except that it appears biased in favor of the driver). The dismissed charge was hit and run, and an element of that charge is knowledge of the accident. In the standard right hook, if the cyclist brakes hard and avoids or taps the car, the driver might not know there was an accident. The correct charge is violation of right of way (in Florida, a noncriminal infraction), not a criminal charge of leaving the scene of an accident.

All this right hook stuff is so foreign to me. How on earth does it happen?

It happens when a cyclist is properly taking the lane in a vehicular fashion, precisely to prevent a right hook, and some moron decides to turn right illegally from a through lane. I have even been right-hooked on a two-lane road, which required the overtaking motorist to turn right, across my path, from the oncoming lane.:(

The environment at that intersection is as follows:

Sidewalks both sides, two northbound lanes, one southbound (IIRC), and a northbound-side bike lane. If the cyclist was headed southbound in the bike lane (or on the northbound-side sidewalk) against traffic, he could hit the left rear tire as the PT cruiser guy turns right off the road after being northbound.

I still don't understand, is this a bike lane thing? I ride almost exclusively in town, and when I go on a ride just for fun, I choose to ride in heavy traffic, so I am always around cars, and never even come close to being right hooked.

Wow, you're just like Will Smith in 'I Am Legend'. Except your genetic immunity is to being hooked by a driver.


:rolleyes:

Not a bike story, but classic of how people don't care!

My wife was 15 weeks pregnant, stopped at red light in the right lane. Light turned green, started to enter the intersection, & the next thing she knew, the lady in the lane to her left SMASHED into the left front of the car! The other driver asked my wife, "Didn't you see my blinker?!" My wife's response, "Didn't you see my car?!"

One "bonus" (so to speak) was the Dr. wanted to do an ultrasound: We got to find out what we were having EARLY!

My wife & Identical Twin Boys were FINE! Hope you were OK as well (including the bike!)!

Chris

You can create a pretty good level of immunity if you use your brain.

I could have been right hooked today, I guess. A car (I think it was a PT Cruiser, coincidentally) was passing me, had gotten not even five yards ahead, then began slowing gradually as he approached an intersection.

Aha! I'll bet he's going to turn! :rolleyes:

No signal, but he started moving to the right. I braked a bit, moved left, and went around his left side as he began his turn.

That was it. I continued on my way, and I'm sitting here typing without a skinned knee, scraped glove, or cracked helmet.

That intersection gets right turns from between a quarter to a half of the through traffic, so I know that the odds are pretty good that a driver near me will want to turn. That's why I never let myself cruise next to a car at that intersection, and I always have an option if I need it.

It's just not difficult.

In regards to the original posting - could it have been that the car overtakes bike, turns right in front of bike, slows down to execute turn (or stops b/c of peds or whatever), and bike, trying to swerve around to the left of turning car hits the drivers side of the car in the rear? I'm not sure if that would count as 'drivers side rear tire', but it seems like a possible scenario - I've certainly had to come to a panic stop behind motorists who overtake and try to turn, but have to slow down or stop to do so.

Driver's side rear bumper, maybe, but not the tire; I would've had to make a U-turn to hit anything on the driver's side of the car I mentioned earlier.

He wasn't aware? I see two tragedies here:
1. He bought a PT Cruiser
2. He didn't see the bicycle.

Unfortunately, neither are crimes in the US :).

Not supporting the driver, but the PT Cruiser is a huge moving blind spot. I had the unfortunate occurrence of having one as a rental once and noticed that it has the wort set of blind spots of any car that I've ever been in.

I have had motorists turn right from the next lane over... the lane closest to the double yellow stripe.

Because it has not happened to you, does not mean it does not happen. BTW I was very well centered in the right lane and out of the door zone when this happened... so a cyclists' road position matters very little to a determined motorist.

Yeah the part where they slow and turn after they have passed makes it pretty clear... What do you do when they don't slow and make a wide fast sweeping turn from the left lane?

:eek: Heading southbound against the north bound traffic. Well, the tone of this post has suddenly reversed itself in my mind. I see no possible right of way for the cyclist in this situation. Please correct me if this is incorrect.

SOmething like this happened to me just a few months ago.

I'm cycling to work at 23 mph in a 25 mph zone in the bike lane. A little red car zooms past me at probably 35 mph, right turn signal and brake lights come on as the driver starts turning right immediately in front of me. I brake and move left to avoid a right hook when the driver at the last second decides there isn't enough room for her to make her turn, so she swerves back to the left and stops. In front of me. I hit the left rear bumper and went up and over the car. This all happened very quickly.

Richard Masoner

Try to turn with the car, I guess, and take their right side mirror as a souvenir. :D

The same thing the driver said when he hooked me. He then went on to say "I turn
here everyday".

I ride bicycles and motorcycles. I look ahead for idiots. Sometimes you just don't see
it coming.